HiRes play back buffering issues

Hi Rob

I have nd5 like you and it's powered on always. My iMac serves the nd5 with playback UPnP software. Everything is connected via cat5e wire and I don't experience the issue you mention. In fact I have never experienced a connection drop since owning for 7 months now. How old is your nd5?

i assume your pc is connected to router with a wired connection?

regards, anton

Hi

Just to be clear I regularly play 192 kHz files with no issues. Buffer always at 100%. I think good advice from Ian if its possible to get another unit from dealer to try.

atb, anton

Sorry Rob. That should have said same problem as you. But it was with FLAC CD rips as well as hi res. at the time I was using home plugs. When the problem started I went to the expense of putting a Cat 5e cable in but the problem persisted. That was when my dealeus started to suspect the unit not my network and so it proved.

since then I have removed my router from the loop by a switch and I never have buffering problems or dropouts at all.

Hi Rob

Unfortunately this sounds almost identical to an issue I have experienced.  My kit then was:

• NDX/XPS2/282/200
• Assett UPnP running on Win 7 Virtual server running on VMWare 4i
• QNAP 509 Pro NAS
• All connection via CAT5e into GB switch
• All files in FLAC and streamed in FLAC

Symptoms were:

After power on, all was ok for two days playing back 192 hires.  After this the buffer would get smaller and smaller, thus resulting in playback failure.  At which point rebuffing would occur and playback would resume.  And the same process would happen again numerous times playing back the same track.  If you were to leave the system ON over time (a week or so) the NDX would fail to play even standard res files!

Having spent many hours performing protocol analysis and debugging, I came to the conclusion this was a fault on the NDX and not a networking/configuration issue.  This can easily be proved by powering off or disconnecting and reconnecting the Ethernet cable.  This has the effect of resetting the network card / UPnP and hey presto back working again for two days.

Resolution:

Once convinced the fault was with the NDX I contacted Naim support.  I spent months trying to convince Naim that the fault was with the NDX; they insisted it was networking issues/equipment issues rather than accept their equipment was at fault.  After THREE replacement NDX’s we got to the point of “fix it” or money back.  Eventually, Naim managed to recreate a very similar fault and had to admit there was an issue.  This resulted in Naim having to make a private release of firmware to fix bugs in the network/decoder card which was eventually included in NDX firmware release 3.16

So after my ramble, my advice to you would be don't waist any more of your time troubleshooting the issue and speak to Naim support.  They should now be able to quickly identify such an issue and help to sort it.

I hope this helps.

Nigel